#Foucault answers that with the author as discursive function

[grandwitchbird]

Excerpt:

“The death of the author means we do not seek to “resolve” art through its creators. At the end of the day, the death of the author is about the consumer of the art. It’s about the consumption of art without ever stopping to ask the author what they want or what they wanted, at least not directly. The reader can ask themselves what they think the author may have intended, but such a reading or interpretation is still rigorously based on the art itself.”

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The death of the author isn’t about ‘headcanon’. It’s not about eradicating authorial craft and labor. It’s about interrogating a text for what it is. It’s about resisting the parasocial drive to seek validation from artists. It’s about thwarting censorship and moralization. It’s about interrogating our own interpretive role. It’s meant to get us closer to the text itself while recognizing all the impediments in the way of any kind of ‘pure’ reading.

In a way, the death of the author leads inevitably to the death of the audience. We are not entitled to a position of authority just because we’ve dethroned the author. This is about centering the art itself and asking more intelligent and creative questions about that art.